Project assures Penn Street a visibly brighter future

Light fixtures like this one at 11th and Penn will soon line both sides of Penn Street all the way down to Second. Older models are being replaced as part of an upgrade project planned for this summer.

Penn Street is slated for $1 million in upgrades this summer that will include new and brighter streetlights from Second to Eighth streets.

It also will include replacing the gap-toothed crosswalks at Penn's intersections with Second and Third, replacing the bouncy bricks with plastic grids like the crosswalk at Eighth and Penn.

Both projects will get underway at the same time, likely August or September, city Public Works Director Charles M. Jones said.

And he said both are funded by federal highway grants, not local tax money.

The city had been waiting for approvals from PennDOT. Jones said the final OKs are expected soon, and the city will seek bids later this month.

Our City Reading, the nonprofit organization of retailer Albert R. Boscov, paid for the engineering design of the new streetlights and got the federal grant to pay the estimated $600,000 cost, Jones said.

The sidewalks will get 20 new poles and new fixtures in the six-block section, which will match those installed in the 800, 900 and 1000 blocks two years ago.

Also, about 100 existing lights will be retrofitted with new fixtures providing more light at less cost, Jones said.

He added that the new fixtures are not LEDS, and won't match those installed on Second Street from Entertainment Square to Reading Area Community College.

A dozen trees will have to be removed to make room for a few new poles, although three new trees will be planted, he said, and some existing trees must be trimmed to ensure the light gets to the sidewalk.

But Jones is happy to be able to rip out the brick crosswalks at the Second and Third streets intersections.

"The bricks drive us nuts, because they keep popping out," he said.

The bricks have been popping out nearly since the crosswalks were installed in 1991 for the Gateway Project.

Each time, the city fills in the hole with macadam, but Jones said the crosswalks are in bad shape.

The project, expected to cost $400,000, will repave each of the two intersections just far enough to include the crosswalk areas: three at Second and four at Third.

While the macadam is still hot, crews will inlay the plastic grids to form 8-foot-wide crosswalks.

The city tried the grid system at Eighth and Penn a decade ago and liked the way it held up, although it's now showing signs of wear.

That grid is a series of wagon wheels, and the new grids will be as well.

But Jones said new PennDOT regulations require it to have straight white lines on the outside to show the crosswalk limits, so those lines will be included in the new grids.

The crews also will bring the handicap ramps at the two intersections up to new standards, Jones said.

McTish, Kunkel & Associates, Allentown, has been awarded a $59,206 contract to monitor the projects.